Female Model Examples

The Business of Professional Photo Retouching

Lesson Info

Female Model Examples

Call attention to the fact, do you guys see I have a sheet here? One of the things when we did the walkthrough on this before it goes crazy really quick. You lose control, there's a lot of people. Have a piece of paper, have a notepad, write it down, make sure you've got a list go. So I think we're ready to call our model up, right?
Yeah.
And Idris, do you wanna come join us, darling? And we're gonna talk about some of these issues and shoot. And oh! Let's talk about the paper.
One sec, Idris.
Yes.
Please, please cover your seamless. Cover your seamless before the job. Do all your prep when you have someone coming in, your testing, your lighting. Cover your seamless because we spend so much time cleaning the seamless, and then when you're ready, when you're all set up- (gasps) Oh, look at that. Perfect seamless. Thanks, John.
Yeah.
And in the middle of the shoot, don't be afraid to say, Hey, can you cut and pull a new seamless out? It's not too expensive, is it?
No.
N...

o. Excellent. So, we're gonna set up here, and we're gonna talk about the process and talk about coverage. So, while they're setting up, one of the things I wanna talk about for coverage: It's not only full-length, three-quarter, and portrait. It's low, it's mid-height and it's from above. So, that's a grid of nine. Now, if you have a model and you're paying a lot of money, hopefully a lot of money for this shoot, you don't wanna do this with your model. You wanna do this with your crew first and figure out the optimum model. Can you pull that little board out from underneath, darlin'? Thank you.
There you are.
You can keep the little sharpie there.
Got it.
Alright. I did not talk about this with you the other day, but I'd like to talk about it now. If you guys, when you're with photographers, if you're doing your set up, you do your grid, you figure out what angle you think is best. While you're doing it, that's where you want to spend the bulk of your shoot time, right? You're still gonna do coverage with your model, but the bulk of it, you want it in the perfect spot, so what I would suggest when you're doing your low, the first setup you write low angle and the lens you used. You do a set up. He switches to mid-level angle. Mid-level with the lens. High level with the lens. Why do you do this? 'Cause when you're scrolling through your bridge or your lightroom and you find the perfect angle, which one was that? It's very hard to see in bridge. Was that the 35-millimeter lens, or was that the 50-millimeter? Was that the 85? Write it down, and then when you do the- With the talent, you're not gonna do that, probably. But with your crew, you'll do that first. Excellent, so why don't we take a look at some issues, and Simon's gonna be over here, and he's gonna call out when he sees trouble. And we're gonna start talking about what trouble looks like on a photo shoot.
So just the same basic thing that we were doing yesterday. And, just I'm gonna have you turn your shoulders a little bit more towards this light, and then just bring your chin up to maybe right about there. I'll see how this looks.
Now, if you notice, he's got the gel on, right? So, he's got-
I'll have you turn your face there. Turn your face, just a little.
He's got a gel, and he's shooting with that, and again, we talked about this earlier. Go ahead and shoot a few frames with the gel on, but then pull it off. Seriously, it will save so much re-touching time. And then, if you notice the camera is tethered, so Simon's gonna see live picture. I need to be really honest what happens on a real photo shoot. This is make believe, we talked about that, right? I'm a ghost, I don't exist. This is what's going on here. In a real photo shot, that is not Simon standing there with a tethered camera. The person standing with the tethered camera is a digitech. And the photographer's deciding settings, what color they want it, and they have these big monitors that they have, and the client, and the photographer, and the digitech are deciding what it looks like, what they want. The re-toucher's gonna be standing in the back, looking over their shoulder and looking at it, and then making calls. The re-toucher will also have a re-touching station from the digitech will then give that re-toucher either a disk drive or a wifi connection, and then the re-toucher will get the files from the digitech. Hopefully that's perfectly clear. Photographer, digitech, re-toucher.
Eyes of re-toucher, you'll have a set of eyes on the shoot, the photographer, and then myself will be the third set of eyes, and I'll have a different set that can zoom in already and find out little baby things that might not be apparent 20 feet away while the lights are going on.
Absolutely, so you've got your photographer. You've got the digitech. The digitech is generally checking for focus and croppage and things like that, and then you've got the re-toucher, so the re-toucher's actually, yeah, the third set of eyes. If there is no budget, and there is no digitech, then said photographer is the digitech in between the re-toucher, and you'll find all sorts of combinations of that. So what we're looking at, I'm gonna go ahead and step on into the set. If you were blessed to be able to go in on a set, normally, re-touchers are not allowed to go in on the set. The people allowed to go in on a set are the photographers, the assistants, and the stylists. Re-touchers, you don't go in on the set. Period. Unless you get permission, and that's a setup, but know that that's unusual, okay, to be allowed to. But if you do, when you go in, you say, going in. You always say, going in before you head in. So I'm going in. And what I'm looking for is stuff like this. Okay, how's her hair? Because I know that this tiny little hair on this lace looks like nothing. He's worried about her expression. That is some re-touching time, especially times 50. And so, as a re-toucher, these are the things I'm looking for, and then I'm gonna let the photographer shoot this, and then I'm gonna say, Hey, do you mind shooting back? That is, how much money would you say that is, to pull that off?
To sit there and take the hair off a lace? No, darling, to on the computer. That.
Oh, yeah.
How much money to take that out?
It's 15 minutes, 20 minutes.
15, 20 minutes of re-touching time.
Times every shot.
Right there.
It adds up when you start looking at it. What else? So this fabric, so things like this, that this wrinkle in a lace piece. Oof!
Talking, everything's ten minutes here.
Every single one. Alright, what else do I wanna talk about that? Okay, so coverage, we've discussed coverage. Medium, full, tight. We're not gonna have Casey run through that, 'cause it's a little cumbersome, but imagine he's gonna pull back. He's gonna go mid-level, and then he's gonna go up tight.
Lisa, at this point, if I were looking back here, I would ask you, or I would ask the photographer if the pants were pulled snugly.
Yes.
I would also be looking at sneakers at this point. If someone came in with, like, older sneakers that were discolored, scuffed up, that's when I'd be like, Okay, is there any way to bleach those out, clean those things off, or whatever, or I gotta do it digitally, and it's gonna-
Windex, right there. Windex is your best friend.
Yup, that'd be what I'd be looking at right now.
Absolutely. The other thing is, and she doesn't really have it, it's pretty good, she doesn't have static. She doesn't have too much static. Oh, that static, I can't even- Can you imagine stripping out all that with static? Because when you strip out static hair, that means you have to repaint nice hair. Dah, on every single one.
And if it's staticky hair against something, like, say, purple balloons, that gets even more involved. We've had that before.
What did you say? I'm sorry, say that again?
Staticky hair against a bunch of purple balloons.
Oh, Cindy Crawford, yeah, that was a good job
You said it.
I did, I said it, it was a Cindy Crawford job. Now, I think we can skip the balloon, but can I have that blazer darlin'? I wanna show you this is another thing where honestly-
Thank you.
Keep that, thank you very much. Very cute, cute, I'm gonna have you put this on, sweetie.
Thank you.
A nightmare to body shape. It's cute, it's adorable, but because of the plaid, it's got a tweed to it, and it's got bricks, so even though this looks absolutely adorable, to body shape it is a nightmare. Now, let's be real. Your client's selling plaid blazers. You're shooting plaid blazers. It's gotta be done. What are you gonna do? It's the job. You talk to the stylist, you spend an extra 15 minutes if it's necessary to tape, to pin, to crop, to do whatever. Oftentimes you'll hear on a shoot. How many times have you heard this? Ah, fix it and post, we can trim that and post. You gotta know when it's not cost-effective to fix it and post. So this would be not a fix it and post situation. Yeah, and her nails are great. See, she gets gold star. Great nails, come manicured. Let's see, what else? Do we wanna-
And we got jewelry to pay attention to.
Yeah, definitely, so this is one of the things where you really wanna - thank you, sweetheart - you want to check with your model, and again, you're the re-toucher, so you gotta talk to somebody else. Definitely have someone on there. 'Cause do you fidget with your ring?
I fidget sometimes.
Yeah
And it moves.
Yeah, and it's an unconscious thing, so you wanna engage everybody to ask them, Can you check for the ring? Especially, you've got a nice rock there, when it's a big one, and it's turned. It's 'cause you're not just straightening the ring. You gotta recreate the face of the ring.
And then when you pull the ring out from here onto the front, now you gotta retouch that finger back in as well, as opposed to a one-second ring turn. It all adds up.
Excellent.
So that's all the stuff we got bit by.
Yeah, I know these are
Mark it down, take it off. tiny little things but I cannot begin to tell you how much money this adds up to. Now, another thing, it might be a little difficult. I don't know if you can get a shot of her ankle, by any chance, so we can show it up on the screen. We have asked Idris to put a rubber band on her ankle to simulate the lovely condition that happens when you wear tube socks before you go to a photo shoot. Happens all the time, we have actress' legs, where they get a mark, and how many? We did that CBS show with the gals, we're not gonna name it.
No.
And how many shots did we do, 25? 25 shots of an ensemble cast for CBS, full on tube socks, they must've been wearing before the shoot, full on. Because it was like the wobbly ribs and everything. (Popping noise) And no one looks for it. Again, I think it's a little higher up here. Hard to see, but what you wanna - Obviously, they're not gonna have a rubber band around their ankle, but it's just to simulate.
To illustrate the point. Do you get bra strap lines?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, and I don't - sorry sweetheart - I don't think we can see it here, but yeah, on this kind of costuming, if, and why are we telling you this? It's the product, you have to shoot it. It's 'cause as the re-toucher, when you walk in with, and I see that, I got, Great, that just upped the estimate. And before I walk off that set, Can you just sign here on the upgraded estimate? 'Cause that's gonna cost more money. And I'm not being rude, I'm being nice. I'm just saying this is gonna cost more money because of your costume choice.
But, I'm sorry, the point I was trying to make is that the model would come in with a bra strap marks over where it normally would fall, and then the costume would be no shoulders.
Yeah.
No fabric on their shoulders, and that would be apparent, and I'm not, the fix, I guess, would just be massage it out or wait a minute, or change -
Well, do you remember at the beginning we had the checklist, we talked about the checklist. So, a pre-shoot checklist, you tell the photographer to give the model a checklist. Wax, please, if that's appropriate. Don't wear a bra the night before. No tube socks. Get a manicure, we'll pay for it, or come in early, and we'll give you a manicure. It's these little tiny things that keep adding up.

Class Description

Create your own retouching business from the ground up. In this class, one of Hollywood¹s hottest retouchers reveals the secrets to designing your own business. Lisa Carney walks through the steps needed to start and run a smooth business while keeping your clients engaged and happy. Whether you’re looking to work with photographers, agencies or even bill for post production - you’re bound to find valuable insight into the world of photo retouching.

This class covers:

Defining the type of retoucher you want to be

Solutions for the problems you’ll encounter on shoots and in post production

Communication techniques for clients

Secrets for setting realistic expectations from markups through revisions

Pricing your services and handling billing issues

Emergency tips for when jobs go off the rails

Get the inside scoop from a true insider. You’ll finish this class knowing how to construct a profitable photo retouching business model AND develop the tools to sustain it.

Bill Buckley

I'm a photographer who wants to be as good at Photoshop as possible. In my field few retouchers get hired, so it's all on me. Plus my creative vision cannot be accomplished by photography alone. Not to mention that in the field, as a photographer I can't always be perfect. Photoshop to the rescue. This is possibly THE best class I've purchased on Creative Live, and they've all been good. Great insight, entertaining, well taught Lisa and Simon were awesome. Bought more LC tutorials based on this course.

Kari A. Youkey

This course just opened my world.
I started ( back in the Jurassic era) as an illustrator/drafter ( pen and ink), then CAD programmer, then GIS analyst with photoshop just coming onto the scene then...got pregnant and unplugged focusing on parenting and my inner artist. I was gifted an IPad 6 years ago in the mist of my Taxi Mom years. My favorite ‘hobby’ became manipulating images and an addiction to Adobe apps. Now, In my new empty nest status, I have been trying to figure out my next direction in life....and CreativeLive has been a wonderful resource to explore different creative opportunities, feeling somewhere between photography and graphic design, I wanted to ‘paint’ photos with my tool of choice the tablet, not the camera.
...but it wasn’t until this course that I clicked with an Aha! I don’t have to become an photographer? I could get paid to retouch? Other people’s photos?.....and, I have a work history skill set that backs it up!
Thank you so much for this course! Loved the instructors and how they shared their experiences and knowledge. You two have just provided a wonderful map and whole new path to explore and inspired a much needed creative spark to get back to work❤️.
Thank You!

a Creativelive Student

Lisa knocked it out of the ball park again! Amazing work Lisa and Simon! I just can't find the many words that express how much I gain with each and every course she teaches. Once again, a wealth of information that was given in a down to earth manner. I absolutely love her teaching style! Amazing course Lisa and Simon, awesome job!